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Stephen Glenn Martin (born August 14, 1945) is an
American comedian, writer, producer,
actor, musician and composer born in Waco, Texas
and raised in Orange County, California.

In a 2005 poll to find The Comedian's Comedian,
Martin was voted amongst the top 20 greatest
comedy acts ever by fellow comedians and comedy
insiders.

==Early years==
Martin worked at the Bird Cage Theater in Knott's
Berry Farm and at the Magic Shop at Disneyland as
a teenager, where he developed his talents for
Magic (illusion)|magic, juggling, playing the
banjo and creating balloon animals.

Martin majored in philosophy at California State
University, Long Beach, but dropped out. 
Nevertheless, his time there changed his life:

:"It changed what I believe and what I think about
everything. I majored in philosophy. Something
about non sequiturs appealed to me. In philosophy,
I started studying logic, and they were talking
about cause and effect, and you start to realize,
"Hey, there is no cause and effect! There is no
logic! There is no anything!" Then it gets real
easy to write this stuff, because all you have to
do is twist everything hard — you twist the
climax (narrative)|punch line, you twist the non
sequitur so hard away from the things that set I
up, that it's easy... and it's thrilling."

Martin's girlfriend in 1967 was a dancer on The
Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour and helped Martin
land a job as a writer for the program. Along with
the other writers for that show, Martin won an
Emmy Award in 1969. Martin also wrote for John
Denver (a neighbor of his in Aspen, Colorado at
one point)  and The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour.

He then started performing his own material,
sometimes as an opening act for groups such as The
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and The Carpenters, after
which began writing for such variety shows as The
Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, The Glen Campbell
Goodtime Hour, and The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour.
He also appeared on these shows, and numerous
others, in numerous comedy skits.

He appeared at San Francisco's The Boarding House
among other locations.  He continued to write,
earning an Emmy nomination for his work on  Van
Dyke and Company in 1975.

==Becoming a household name==
In the mid-1970s he made frequent appearances as a
stand-up comedian on The Tonight Show with Johnny
Carson.  That exposure, together with appearances
on NBC's Saturday Night Live (SNL), led to his
first of four comedy albums, Let's Get Small.  The
album was a huge success; one of its tracks,
Excuse Me, helped establish a national catch
phrase.

His next album, A Wild and Crazy Guy, was an even
bigger success reaching the number two spot on the
chart, and spawning another catch phrase, this
time based on an SNL skit where Martin and Dan
Aykroyd played a couple of bumbling
Czechoslovakian playboys. A top 40 hit King Tut,
from the album, released in 1978, was backed by
the Toot Uncommons (better known as the Nitty
Gritty Dirt Band).  Both were million sellers.

Both albums won Grammys for Best Comedy Recording
in 1977 and 1978.

In these and his two other albums, Martin's
stand-up comedy was self-referential, sometimes
self-mocking.  It mixes philosophical riffs with
sudden spurts of "happy feet", deft banjo playing
with balloon depictions of concepts like venereal
disease.  His style is off kilter and ironic, and
sometimes makes fun of stand-up comedy traditions.
 A typical gag might be interrupted for a sip from
a glass of water, and just as he was about to
speak again, he forcefully spits the water onto
the floor.

== Movie career ==

By the end of the 1970s, he had acquired the kind
of following normally reserved for rock stars,
with his tour appearances typically occurring at
sold-out arenas filled with tens of thousands of
screaming fans.  But unknown to his audience,
stand-up comedy was "just an accident" for him. 
His real goal was to get into film.

Martin's first film was a short, The Absent-Minded
Waiter (1977). The seven-minute long film, also
featuring Buck Henry and Teri Garr, was written by
and starred Martin.  The film was nominated for an
Academy Award as Best Short Film, Live Action.

In 1979, Martin wrote and starred in his first
full-length movie, The Jerk (film)|The Jerk,
directed by Carl Reiner. The movie was a huge
success, grossing $100 million on a budget less
than a twentieth of that amount.

The success of The Jerk opened more doors for him.
 Stanley Kubrick met with him to discuss him
starring in an early, screwball comedy version of
Traumnovelle (Kubrick later changed his approach
to the material).  He was executive producer for a
prime-time TV series starring Martin Mull and a
late-night series called Twilight Theater.  It
emboldened him to try his hand at his first
serious film, Pennies From Heaven, a movie he was
anxious to do because of the desire to avoid being
typecasting (acting)|typecast.  To prepare for
that film, he took acting lessons from the
director, Herbert Ross, and spent months learning
how to tap dance.  The film was a financial
failure; Martin's comment at the time was "I don't
know what to blame, other than it's me and not a
comedy."

Martin was in two more Reiner-directed comedies
after The Jerk: Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid in 1982,
and The Man with Two Brains in 1983.

In 1986, Martin joined fellow Saturday Night Live
veterans Martin Short and Chevy Chase in Three
Amigos|¡Three Amigos!, which was directed by
John Landis, and written by Martin, Lorne Michaels
and Randy Newman. It was originally entitled The
Three Caballeros and Martin was to be teamed with
Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi.

In 1987, Martin joined comedian John Candy in the
John Hughes film, Planes, Trains & Automobiles. 
That same year, Roxanne (movie)|Roxanne, a film he
cowrote, won him a Writers Guild of America award
and more importantly, the recognition from
Hollywood and the public that he was more than a
comedian.

Martin starred in the Ron Howard (American
director)|Ron Howard film, Parenthood in 1989.

In the same year, 1991, Martin starred in a
lighthearted comedy (L.A. Story) and an
Existentialism|existentialist tragedy (Grand
Canyon (movie)|Grand Canyon) that were both about
the city of Los Angeles.

In 1997, Martin played a darker role as an rich
man manipulating inventor Campbell Scott in David
Mamet's thriller The Spanish Prisoner. 

In 1999, Martin and Goldie Hawn starred in a
remake of the 1970 Neil Simon comedy, The
Out-of-Towners.

== Other work ==
Throughout the 90s, after Tina Brown took over The
New Yorker, Martin wrote various pieces for the
magazine. They later appeared in the collection
Pure Drivel.

He appeared in a version of Waiting for Godot as
Vladimir (character)|Vladimir (with  Robin
Williams as Estragon).

In 1993, Martin wrote the play Picasso at the
Lapin Agile, which had a successful run in several
United States|American cities.

In 2001, Martin hosted the 73rd Annual Academy
Awards. He repeated his hosting duties in 2003.

In 2002, Martin adapted the Carl Sternheim play
The Underpants, which ran Off-Broadway at Classic
Stage Company.

Martin has guest-hosted Saturday Night Live 13
times, more than any other person.

== Art collection ==
Martin is an avid art collector, particularly
modern American art, and a trustee of the Los
Angeles County Museum of Art. Martin's personal
collection has at one time included the art of
Georgia O'Keeffe|O'Keeffe, John Henry
Twachtman|Twachtman, Richard
Diebenkorn|Diebenkorn, Willem de Kooning|de
Kooning, Franz Kline|Kline, Cy Twombly|Twombly,
Helen Frankenthaler|Frankenthaler, Edward
Hopper|Hopper, David Hockney|Hockney, Roy
Lichtenstein|Lichtenstein, and Pablo
Picasso|Picasso.

On February 8, 2005 The Huntington Library in San
Marino, California announced that Martin had
pledged $1 million over five years for the
museum's American art collection.
http://www.huntington.org/Information/news/SteveMa
rtin.pdf Three-quarters of the gift will be used
for exhibitions, and the remaining $250,000 will
go toward acquisitions. Before he made his pledge,
Martin loaned paintings to the museum, helped it
acquire a sculpture by John Gregory
(Sculptor)|John Gregory, and sponsored an
exhibition of "sugar paintings" by 19th century
American artist Eastman Johnson.  Jessica Todd
Smith, the museum's American art curator, said
Martin became an "enthusiastic" supporter of The
Huntington after he visited the museum in 2002
while filming a movie nearby.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/200502
09/ap_en_mo/people_steve_martin

== Bibliography ==
* Cruel Shoes (1979)
* Picasso at the Lapin Agile and Other Plays:
Picasso at the Lapin Agile, the Zig-Zag Woman,
Patter for the Floating Lady, Wasp (1996)
* L.A. Story and Roxanne: Two Screenplays (1997)
* Pure Drivel (1998)
* Shopgirl (2001)
* The Underpants: A Play (2002)
* The Pleasure of My Company (2003)

== Discography ==
* Let's Get Small (1977)
* A Wild and Crazy Guy, (1978)
* Comedy is Not Pretty! (1979)
* The Steve Martin Brothers (1981)

==Filmography==
*The Absent-Minded Waiter (1977 in film|1977)
(short subject) (also writer)
*Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1978 in
film|1978)
*The Muppet Movie (1979 in film|1979) (cameo)
*The Kids Are Alright (1979) (documentary)
*The Jerk (1979) (also writer)
*Pennies from Heaven (1981 in film|1981)
*Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982 in film|1982)
(also writer)
*The Man with Two Brains (1983 in film|1983) (also
writer)
*The Lonely Guy (1984 in film|1984)
*All of Me (1984)
*Movers & Shakers (1985 in film|1985)
*Three Amigos! (1986 in film|1986) (also executive
producer and writer)
*Little Shop of Horrors (1986)
*Roxanne (movie)|Roxanne (1987 in film|1987) (also
executive producer and writer)
*Planes, Trains & Automobiles (1987)
*Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988 in film|1988)
*Parenthood (1989 in film|1989)
*My Blue Heaven (1990 movie)|My Blue Heaven (1990
in film|1990)
*L.A. Story (1991 in film|1991) (also executive
producer and writer)
*Father of the Bride (1991)
*Grand Canyon (1991)
*HouseSitter (1992 in film|1992)
*Leap of Faith (1992)
*A Simple Twist of Fate (1994 in film|1994) (also
executive producer and writer)
*Mixed Nuts (1994)
*Father of the Bride Part II (1995 in film|1995)
*Sgt. Bilko (1996 in film|1996)
*The Spanish Prisoner (1997 in film|1997) 
*The Prince of Egypt (1998 in film|1998) (voice)
*The Out-of-Towners (1999 in film|1999)
*Bowfinger (1999) (also writer)
*The Venice Project (1999) (cameo)
*Fantasia/2000 (1999)
*Thin Ice (2000 in film|2000) 
*Joe Gould's Secret (2000)
*Novocaie (movie)|Novocaine (2001 in film|2001)
*Bringing Down the House (2003 in film|2003)
*Looney Tunes: Back in Action (2003)
*Cheaper by the Dozen (2003)|Cheaper by the Dozen
(2003)
*Jiminy Glick in La La Wood (2004 in film|2004)
(cameo)
*Shopgirl (2005 in film|2005) (also producer and
writer)
*The Pink Panther (scheduled for 2005) (as
Inspector Clouseau)

	Web Quotableonline.com Frasescelebres.org Greatbookscollection.org

Stephen Glenn Martin (born August 14, 1945) is an
United States|American comedian, writer, producer,
actor, musician, and composer born in Waco, Texas
and raised in Orange County, California.

In a 2005 poll to find The Comedian's Comedian,
Martin was voted amongst the top 20 greatest
comedy acts ever by fellow comedians and comedy
insiders.

==Early years==
Martin worked at the Bird Cage Theater in Knott's
Berry Farm and at the Magic Shop at Disneyland as
a teenager, where he developed his talents for
Magic (illusion)|magic, juggling, playing the
banjo, and creating balloon animals.

Martin majored in philosophy at California State
University, Long Beach, but dropped out. 
Nevertheless, his time there changed his life:
:"It changed what I believe and what I think about
everything. I majored in philosophy. Something
about non sequiturs appealed to me. In philosophy,
I started studying logic, and they were talking
about cause and effect, and you start to realize,
"Hey, there is no cause and effect! There is no
logic! There is no anything!" Then it gets real
easy to write this stuff, because all you have to
do is twist everything hard—you twist the
climax (narrative)|punch line, you twist the non
sequitur so hard away from the things that set I
up, that it's easy... and it's thrilling."

Martin's girlfriend in 1967 was a dancer on The
Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour and helped Martin
land a job as a writer for the program. Along with
the other writers for that show, Martin won an
Emmy Award in 1969. Martin also wrote for John
Denver (a neighbor of his in Aspen,
Colorado|Aspen, Colorado at one point), The Glen
Campbell Goodtime Hour, and The Sonny and Cher
Comedy Hour. He also appeared on these shows, and
numerous others, in numerous comedy skits.

Martin also performed his own material, sometimes
as an opening act for groups such as The Nitty
Gritty Dirt Band and The Carpenters. He appeared
at San Francisco's The Boarding House among other
locations.  He continued to write, earning an Emmy
nomination for his work on  Van Dyke and Company
in 1975.

==Becoming a household name==
In the mid-1970s he made frequent appearances as a
stand-up comedian on The Tonight Show with Johnny
Carson.  That exposure, together with appearances
on NBC's Saturday Night Live (SNL), led to his
first of four comedy albums, Let's Get Small.  The
album was a huge success; one of its tracks,
Excuse Me, helped establish a national catch
phrase.

His next album, A Wild and Crazy Guy, was an even
bigger success, reaching the #2 spot on the sales
chart in the US, and spawning another catch
phrase, this time based on an SNL skit where
Martin and Dan Aykroyd played a couple of bumbling
Czechoslovakian playboys. The album also featured
a top 40 hit "King Tut", released in 1978, was
backed by the Toot Uncommons (better known as the
Nitty Gritty Dirt Band).  Both were million
sellers. Both albums won Grammys for Best Comedy
Recording in 1977 and 1978.

In these and his two other albums, Martin's
stand-up comedy was self-referential, sometimes
self-mocking.  It mixes philosophical riffs with
sudden spurts of "happy feet", deft banjo playing
with balloon depictions of concepts like venereal
disease.  His style is off kilter and ironic, and
sometimes makes fun of stand-up comedy traditions.
 A typical gag might be interrupted for a sip from
a glass of water, and just as he was about to
speak again, he forcefully spits the water onto
the floor.

== Movie career ==
By the end of the 1970s, Steve Martin had acquired
the kind of following normally reserved for rock
stars, with his tour appearances typically
occurring at sold-out arenas filled with tens of
thousands of screaming fans.  But unknown to his
audience, stand-up comedy was "just an accident"
for him.  His real goal was to get into film.

Martin's first film was a short, The Absent-Minded
Waiter (1977). The seven-minute long film, also
featuring Buck Henry and Teri Garr, was written by
and starred Martin.  The film was nominated for an
Academy Award as Best Short Film, Live Action.

In 1979, Martin wrote and starred in his first
full-length movie, The Jerk (film)|The Jerk,
directed by Carl Reiner. The movie was a huge
success, grossing $100 million on a budget less
than a twentieth of that amount.

The success of The Jerk opened more doors for
Martin.  Stanley Kubrick met with him to discuss
him starring in an early, screwball comedy version
of Traumnovelle (Kubrick later changed his
approach to the material).  Martin was executive
producer for Domestic Life, a prime-time
television series starring Martin Mull, and a
late-night series called Twilight Theater.  It
emboldened Martin to try his hand at his first
serious film, Pennies From Heaven, a movie he was
anxious to do because of the desire to avoid being
typecasting (acting)|typecast.  To prepare for
that film, Martin took acting lessons from the
director, Herbert Ross and spent months learning
how to tap dance.  The film was a financial
failure; Martin's comment at the time was "I don't
know what to blame, other than it's me and not a
comedy."

Martin was in two more Reiner-directed comedies
after The Jerk: Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid in 1982,
and The Man with Two Brains in 1983. In 1986,
Martin joined fellow Saturday Night Live veterans
Martin Short and Chevy Chase in Three
Amigos|¡Three Amigos!, which was directed by
John Landis, and written by Martin, Lorne Michaels
and Randy Newman. It was originally entitled The
Three Caballeros and Martin was to be teamed with
Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi.

In 1987, Martin joined comedian John Candy in the
John Hughes film, Planes, Trains & Automobiles. 
That same year, the Cyrano de Bergerac adaptation
Roxanne (movie)|Roxanne, a film Martin co-wrote,
won him a Writers Guild of America award and more
importantly, the recognition from Hollywood and
the public that he was more than a comedian.

Martin starred in the Ron Howard (American
director)|Ron Howard film, Parenthood in 1989. In
the same year, 1991, Martin starred in a
lighthearted comedy (L.A. Story) and an
Existentialism|existentialist tragedy (Grand
Canyon (movie)|Grand Canyon) that were both about
the life in Los Angeles.

In 1997, Martin played a darker role as an rich
man manipulating inventor Campbell Scott in David
Mamet's thriller The Spanish Prisoner. In 1999,
Martin and Goldie Hawn starred in a remake of the
1970 Neil Simon comedy, The Out-of-Towners.

== Other work ==
Throughout the 90s, after Tina Brown took over The
New Yorker, Martin wrote various pieces for the
magazine. They later appeared in the collection
Pure Drivel. He appeared in a version of Waiting
for Godot as Vladimir (character)|Vladimir (with 
Robin Williams as Estragon).

In 1993, Martin wrote the play Picasso at the
Lapin Agile, which had a successful run in several
United States|American cities. In 2001, Martin
hosted the 73rd Annual Academy Awards. He repeated
his hosting duties in 2003. In 2002, Martin
adapted the Carl Sternheim play The Underpants,
which ran Off-Broadway at Classic Stage Company.
In 2005, Martin hosted a film along with Donald
Duck, Disneyland: The First 50 Magical Years,
which shows at Disneyland's Main Street,
U.S.A.|Main Street Opera House until the end of
Happiest Homecoming on Earth|Disneyland's 50th
Anniversary celebration in September, 2006.

Martin has guest-hosted Saturday Night Live 13
times, more than any other person. He has also
written two novels, Shopgirl and The Pleasure of
My Company.

== Art collection ==
Martin is an avid art collector, particularly
modern art|modern American art, and a trustee of
the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Martin's
personal collection has at one time included the
art of Georgia O'Keeffe, John Henry Twachtman,
Richard Diebenkorn, Willem de Kooning, Franz
Kline, Cy Twombly, Helen Frankenthaler, Edward
Hopper, David Hockney, Roy Lichtenstein, and Pablo
Picasso.

In 2005, The Huntington Library in San Marino,
California announced that Martin had pledged US$1
million over five years for the museum's American
art collection.
http://www.huntington.org/Information/news/SteveMa
rtin.pdf Three-quarters of the gift will be used
for exhibitions, with the remainder being used for
acquisitions. Before he made his pledge, Martin
loaned paintings to the museum, helped it acquire
a sculpture by John Gregory (Sculptor)|John
Gregory, and sponsored an exhibition of "sugar
paintings" by 19th century American artist Eastman
Johnson.  Jessica Todd Smith, the museum's
American art curator, said Martin became an
"enthusiastic" supporter of The Huntington after
he visited the museum in 2002 while filming a
movie nearby.
http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/200502
09/ap_en_mo/people_steve_martin

== Bibliography ==
* Cruel Shoes (1979)
* Picasso at the Lapin Agile and Other Plays:
Picasso at the Lapin Agile, the Zig-Zag Woman,
Patter for the Floating Lady, Wasp (1996)
* L.A. Story and Roxanne: Two Screenplays
(published together in 1997)
* Pure Drivel (1998)
* Shopgirl (2001)
* The Underpants: A Play (2002)
* The Pleasure of My Company (2003)

== Discography ==
* Let's Get Small (1977)
* A Wild and Crazy Guy, (1978)
* Comedy is Not Pretty! (1979)
* The Steve Martin Brothers (1981)

==Selected Filmography==
*Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (film)|Sgt.
Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (1978 in
film|1978)
*The Muppet Movie (1979 in film|1979) (cameo)
*The Kids Are Alright (1979) (documentary)
*The Jerk (film)|The Jerk (1979) (also writer)
*Pennies from Heaven (1981 in film|1981)
*Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid (1982 in film|1982)
(also writer)
*The Man with Two Brains (1983 in film|1983) (also
writer)
*Little Shop of Horrors (1986)
*Roxanne (movie)|Roxanne (1987 in film|1987) (also
executive producer and writer)
*Planes, Trains & Automobiles (1987)
*Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988 in film|1988)
*Parenthood (1989 in film|1989)
*My Blue Heaven (1990 movie)|My Blue Heaven (1990
in film|1990)
*L.A. Story (1991 in film|1991) (also executive
producer and writer)
*Father of the Bride (1991 movie)|Father of the
Bride (1991)
*HouseSitter (1992 in film|1992)
*The Spanish Prisoner (1997 in film|1997) 
*The Prince of Egypt (1998 in film|1998) (voice)
*Bowfinger (1999) (also writer)
*Fantasia 2000 (1999)
*Thin Ice (2000 in film|2000) 
*Novocaine (movie)|Novocaine (2001 in film|2001)
*Bringing Down the House (2003 in film|2003)
*Looney Tunes: Back in Action (2003)
*Cheaper by the Dozen (2003)|Cheaper by the Dozen
(2003)
*The Pink Panther (2006 in film|2006) (as
Inspector Clouseau)
*Cheaper by the Dozen 2 (2006 in film|2006)

== External links ==

* http://www.stevemartin.com/ Official site
* imdb name|id=0000188|name=Steve Martin